Waiting For You
by Whatsername9890
Summary: Jack Sparrow has a dilema. His compass points toward what he wants most in this world, right? So, what if it's pointing at a person? Sparrington oneshot. Warning: Corny and silly.


This _kind of_ takes place in an AU...and I mean kind of. Please enjoy.

WARNING: This story contains slash. Not heavy slash though. More of a light, feathery slash. Anyway, it's sparrington (Jack Sparrow/James Norrington) so if you no likey, you no readie.

**Waiting For You**

The sea was unusually calm. There was barely a wave on the horizon as Jack Sparrow looked out into the sea. He was leaning his thin frame against the railing of his beloved ship, the _Black Pearl_. It was early evening - dinner time - so the rest of the crew was below deck eating, Besides Will Turner, Elizabeth Swan, and himself. Will and Elizabeth were doing god-knows-what in their cabin.

For the first time in his life, Jack Sparrow was not hungry. This troubled him, and the rest of the crew. Or, at least Gibbs, who had asked kindly, "What the bloody hell is wrong with ye, Jack!" when the Captain of the _Pearl_ had said he would not be dining that night. Jack pulled a compass out of his pocket and opened it in front of him. The bloody compass had been working fine for ages until the prior week when they had put in at Tortuga because his compass led them there. They had stopped there for the night, and the next morning, Jack had come across something quite strange and unexpected.

_"Here, mate, you look like you've had a rough night. Let me help you up." The captain of the _Black Pearl_ said, stepping into the pig pen (literally, the pig pen) and helping this poor lad up to his feet. _

_"Yes, it's been a horrible night. Thank you." The man said, attempting to get the mud and pig slime out of his eyes with one hand, while he held an empty bottle of rum in the other. Jack produced a cloth from his belt and began wiping the mud off of the stranger's face and hair. _

_When he took the cloth away from the other's face, he finally recognized him. "Commodore James Norrington," Jack breathed._

_"Sparrow?" James asked, swaying a little. Had he not been so drunk, he probably would have been embarrassed to be seen in this state by someone who knew him as "Commodore". _

_"Well, love, without your uniform and wig on you look...very...different..." Jack said, looking the Commodore up and down._

_"I'll take that as a compliment. And I'm not Commodore anymore, Sparrow." James said, attempting to run a hand through his hair, but it was caked with mud and his hand got stuck. He cursed, wrenching his hand out and pulling a few hairs with it. "Ow," he said distractedly, shaking his hand to get the mud off._

_Jack smiled. "Well, Former Commodore James Norrington, I seem to be a little short handed on me ship. And if you have no other pressing matters, I request that you accompany me on a splendid voyage." Jack put an arm around Norrington's shoulders and directed him in the direction of the _Pearl_. "Plus, Will Turner and your first love Elizabeth are just two of my fascinating crew."_

_"Oh, I'm over her," James said, swaying a little and attempting to take a drink from his empty rum bottle. "And how could you think she was my first love? I've had...lots...of lovers before I fell in love with Elizabeth, you know, being Commodore and all..."_

_"You can't fool Captain Jack Sparrow, Mr. Norrington. You've prolly never had a lover in your life. But I don't mean to offend you, o' course."_

_"Oh bugger off, Sparrow. I'm just waiting for the..." Norrington faltered, dropping his bottle and leaning on Jack for support. "The...right person...or whatever..."_

Jack grinned, the conversation replaying in his mind. What a strange morning that had been. He looked down at his compass, which was moving slowly back and forth in a southernly direction. The Captain turned around to see James Norrington pacing back and forth, muttering something to himself. Jack put the compass away and leaned against the railing; amused by the former Commodore and wondering what the bloody hell was wrong with his compass.

Jack Sparrow really did not know why Norrington hadn't found a wife yet. He was an interesting guy when not in uniform, as Jack had learned over the last week. He wasn't bad looking, either. The former Commodore was tall and thin, only slightly muscular, with long-ish dark brown hair that he kept pulled back, and a five-o'clock shadow. His eyes were an amazing emerald color-

"Oh, Sparrow, I didn't see you there," James said, pulling Jack out of his thoughts. And what strange thoughts they were.

"Aye, sorry about that," Jack said, turning to look at the water. James joined him, leaning against the rail on Jack's left (remember that Norrington is on Jack's left, or west side; it's important later on), and then he looked up to the sky where the faint traces of stars were beginning to appear. "It's amazing, isn't it? Being out at sea?" Jack sighed. There was no place he would rather be than in the middle of the Caribbean on the _Black Pearl._

"Yes, it is." Norrington agreed. They stood in a comfortable silence for awhile. Jack wondered about this James Norrington man. It was like he turned into a different person when he took off the white powder wig. Could an occupation do so much as to destroy people? If so, such things should be illegal. He wondered how many interesting and enjoyable people had been destroyed by a high-ranking job. Jack would die before he joined the Navy.

James later broke the silence. "Jack, I don't think I want to go back to the Navy, even if I was offered my position back... I'm going to be free from now on," He emphasized his point by spreading his arms wide open towards the sea, almost hitting Jack in the process. The wind blew his hair back from his face, and a true smile could be seen forming on his lips.

"Wow, love," Jack Sparrow commented, leaning more onto the rail and supporting his head with his hand. "You're really smiling. That's a great smile; you should use it more often."

James, not finding anything to say, could not help blushing and so he looked down at the rail, hiding his face. "A great smile"...no one had ever said that to him before. For once, he didn't even mind that Sparrow had called him "love".

And so, in the silence that ensued, Jack pulled out his compass. It pointed directly west. "Interesting," he wondered aloud.

"Hm?" Norrington answered, not putting in enough effort to form a real word.

"It's just my compass." Jack shook the thing as hard as he could; as if that would make a difference. "It's not working. First it was pointing in a southernly direction and moving back and forth, and now it's pointing west..."

"Here, let me have a go." The former commodore said. Jack handed him the compass. Now it pointed east. "Damn compass."

Jack knew that the compass pointed to what he wanted most in this world. Where was it pointing? What was it trying to tell him? Or maybe he just couldn't make up his mind. That was the most likely solution. Although, Jack Sparrow not knowing what he wanted was quite a feat. It was possible, but still a feat. And a large one at that.

"Captain, Commodore," a voice said from behind the two men. They both jumped slightly.

Norrington rolled his eyes as he turned around. "No, not anymore, weren't you listening!"

Gibbs looked thoughtfully at James for a moment. "Er, no. No I wasn't." He said truthfully. Then he turned to look at Jack. Norrington could be seen rolling his eyes again and muttering something that sounded like "bloody rude pirates".

"Gibbs," Jack growled. For some reason he was angry that Gibbs had interrupted the former commodore and himself. Suddenly he felt a rain drop on his nose. He wiped it off, but suddenly felt many more raindrops. It was raining. A shock of thunder came from the north, and James flinched.

"Aye, I've got a feelin' a storm's a brewin', Jack. Ye'd better get below deck, soon's ye done with whatever it is yer doin'." Gibbs informed them, looking proud of himself for predicting the storm, even if he did so after the storm had already begun. It was pouring rain. A random box was thrown overboard, the cause being a great gust of wind.

"How insightful of you, Gibbs." Jack said sarcastically. Norrington chuckled. "Thanks for the warnin', we'll be down as soon as we can." At that, Gibbs frowned and sauntered back to his cabin below deck, not forgetting to grab a bottle of rum on the way.

"That's Gibbs, so intelligent and seaworthy," Jack smiled.

"You're right about the second one, at least," James said, pushing his hair back from his face. "Shall we go below deck, then?"

"Aye, I think so. After you."

They parted awkwardly at Jack's cabin, James proceeding down the hall to wherever his room was. Jack had no idea, but he hoped James did.

The captain of the _Black Pearl_ flopped down onto his king-sized bed. He sighed, turned over and hugged his pillow to his chest. For a few hours, Jack attempted to fall asleep. He couldn't; his mind was too restless. Finally, on the spur of the moment, Jack got out of bed and tossed his hugging pillow aside.

He walked to his desk with wary steps, so as to not step on anything in the darkness, and fumbled around until his hand grasped his compass. Jack opened the compass and could not see it. He lit a small candle and held its burning wick next to the compass. The flame illuminated a little arrow, which pointed southwest. "Hmmm..." Jack wondered.

Ping! Jack had an idea. Maybe what he wanted most was somewhere on the ship. He thought about any sort of treasure or object that had been loaded onto the _Black Pearl_ and came up with nothing.

"I'll just follow the compass." Jack reasoned to himself. He held the candle in one hand and the compass in the other, opening the door to his cabin with his foot. It creaked slightly as he slipped out into the moonlight. Snoring could be heard from below him where most of the crew was sleeping. He followed the compass down the hall and to the left. He was finally led to a door.

Jack Sparrow was not a dumb man. By now he was quite afraid of what part of his mind knew was behind the door. He set down the candle and opened the door just enough to peer in. "What is it, Sparrow?" came a disgruntled voice from within.

"Um, just leaving..." Jack said, turned around, and sprinted back to his room without closing Norrington's door or taking his candle with him.

Jack also left behind a very confused James Norrington. James got up and shut his door, still wearing a confused expression, and sat down on his bed. He was not able to go to sleep for the rest of the night, and so he stayed up wondering what the hell was going on.

In five seconds, Jack rushed back to his room and slammed the door shut, leaning against it and breathing heavily. After he caught his breath, he moved across the room and sat on his bed. Then he did what any pirate would do in such a situation: he drank some rum.

"This compass is magical..." A drunken Jack mused some hours later. "It never lies. It always shows what you want most. And then it pointed at James bloody Norrington." He stopped and began thinking, something very difficult to do when completely smashed. "Although, as long as I'm talking to myself I'd better tell me that I'm in love with him."

"What? Me, in love with Norrington? I haven't been in love in my whole life, let alone with James Norrington, who's the Commodore of Port Royal. Or he used to be. Anyway, even if it was true it'd never work. But maybe it could, since he's not commodore anymore and he doesn't have a girl to get back to or anything." Jack continued mumbling to himself and not really making any sense for...um...let's just say, for the purpose of this fanfic, a really long time.

The captain of the _Black Pearl_ was interrupted by a knock on the door. He stiffened. "Come in," he called warily.

The former Commodore, after not being able to sleep, finally decided at 5:00 the next morning that he would just ask Jack himself. He hauled himself out of bed and walked to Jack's cabin, where he knocked on the door. He didn't really care if the pirate was asleep or not. "Come in," a wary voice came from inside, definitely belonging to Sparrow.

James opened the door and peered in. Everything seemed normal...well, kind of. Jack was just sitting on his bed looking up at his visitor with wide eyes and a small smile. "Um, hello." James began awkwardly, closing the door and standing next to it. "I was just-"

"Commodore. Er, James, or whatever the hell your name is, would you do me an eensy weensy favor?" Jack asked, taking his compass out from somewhere and opening it.

"Well, I guess so. What is it?" Norrington asked, noticing the empty bottles of rum lying next to the man.

Jack glanced up, then at the desk to his left, then back to the compass. "Just walk over to the desk on my left, would you love." Norrington did so, but that confused look came back and he raised an eyebrow at Sparrow. Sparrow was looking at his compass. It followed Norrington to the desk. "Now walk over to my other side, by the closet." James did so, becoming even more bewildered with each step. "Now just go stand by the-"

"Sparrow, what the bloody hell are you doing?"

The compass moved every time that Norrington walked around the room. It followed him, even as he took a single step away from the closet. Jack sighed. If there was one thing he did _not_ want to do, it was explaining to Norrington that he was hopelessly in love with him. It would be thoroughly embarrassing and then he would be heartbroken and it would take a long time to heal and Jack just didn't want to have to deal with all that misery. So he took the easy way out. "Alright, I'm done. You can leave now."

James was about to protest. He stopped himself, though, when he noticed that the pirate's usually jolly face was now distorted with sadness as he averted his dark eyes from Norrington's piercing emerald ones. He sat down on the bed next to the out of character pirate and rested a comforting hand on his shoulder. "What's wrong?" Norrington asked quietly, concern showing in his voice. Jack leaned against James, and closed his eyes and sighed but the former commodore received no reply.

If Jack had had his eyes open, he would have noticed a slight flush on Norrington's cheeks as he awkwardly put an arm around Jack's shoulders. Weariness overtook them and within a minute, both of the men were asleep, sitting on Jack's bed and leaning against the wall.

Some hours later, an innocent (psh! hardly!) sailor named Gibbs awoke to sunlight streaming into his eyes. He rolled over and cursed the sun for coming up so early. He threatened it to go back down so he could sleep in peace, but it would not stop shining. Gibbs finally rolled off of his hammock in the crew's quarters and made his way up to the deck with a pounding headache (probably a hangover). He cured this with more rum, and was halfway through a bottle when he realized the Captain was not awake yet.

Gibbs made his way down to the Captain's cabin. He knocked lightly. No answer. So Gibbs pushed open the door, quietly, and was quite taken aback at the scene before him.

Jack and the former commodore Norrington were sitting on Jack's bed, with their backs leaning against the wall behind them. Norrington's arms were wrapped around Jack and the Captain was leaning against him, with his face breathing on James's neck, and stirring the former commodore's long dark hair with every breath. To top it all off, James was resting his head on top of Jack's head. It was a picture perfect moment! Only if cameras had been invented...

Gibbs, on the other hand, could not take his eyes away. He did not know whether to shudder with disgust or say "awww" and swoon. So he just stared. Norrington was the first to wake up and notice the staring. He opened his eyes and smiled, having no idea what he was smiling about, and just sighed with content and it was very dramatic. That is, until he realized that this was not a pillow, it was a big lump of hair that he was resting his head against and he panicked. Panicked, in this story, meaning that his eyes grew wide and he shrieked, leaning to the side and falling off the end of Jack's bed.

Jack woke up to the feeling of falling, and was soon pulled off of the bed (on accident) as Norrington slid down. Jack landed on top of James, lying face to face with him, with only his two hands on either side of Norrington's face keeping him up. "Good morning, love," the captain of the _Black Pearl_ said huskily, not really knowing what was going on but liking this position. "G-good m-morning," James stammered. "Uhm, g-good morning to you too, Gibbs."

"Huh? Gibbs?" Jack questioned. He looked up to see good old Gibbs, with a knack for unknowingly ruining all of his moments with Norrington, standing by the door awkwardly and not knowing what to do.

James's face was flushed as he pushed Jack off of him and stood up, untangling himself from the sheets. "I-I'm going to, um, go get dressed." He mumbled and left the room, leaving Jack lying on the floor and Gibbs standing near the doorway.

Jack looked down and sighed. He brought his fist down and hit the wood floor of his cabin, making a loud noise that startled Gibbs. Seeing that his Captain needed some alone time, Gibbs excused himself and fled back up to the deck, where he would never speak of that again.

Jack Sparrow, still not feeling satisfied with punching the floor, hit it with his head. "Ow, goddammit," he whispered. The room seemed almost darker as Jack curled up in the sheets that had been brought to the floor. He just knew that his chances were completely ruined with James. He covered his head in shame, and lay there believing that he was alone in the world for about two hours before he gave it up and walked up on deck.

The crew greeted Jack warmly as he stepped out into the fresh sunlight from below deck. He smiled, gave a few orders, and made sure everything was going smoothly, before he pulled out his compass (out of habit) and saw that it was pointing towards the front of the boat. He took a step left so that the mast wasn't blocking his view, and saw the object of his affections leaning against the rail, with the wind tossing his hair about his face. The sun shone from behind him and illuminated his features with a warm glow. Again, a picture perfect moment and damn...no camera... Just gazing at James, Jack felt hope that it wasn't all over and he still had a chance.

Norrington was surprised when Jack came up from behind him and prodded him on the shoulder. "Oh, hi Jack." He said. "Well, about this morning..."

Jack smiled one of his signature crazy smiles. "Don't you worry about it, love. I've got it covered. You see, I've been meaning to tell you something, but I've been too chicken lately."

"Go on," James said as Jack paused for a moment.

"I, well, do you know what my compass points towards?"

"Well, it's broken, isn't it?"

"No. It points at what you want most in this world. See, me and my crew pulled in at Tortuga since that's where me compass led us. Then we picked you up and it started acting strange. I figured that I just couldn't make up my mind as to what I wanted, but then I noticed that it always seemed to be pointing towards...you. It led me to your room last night. By the way, sorry about that."

"Apology accepted."

"Anyway, it led me to your room. Then, when you came to my room, I had you walk around to see if the compass followed you."

"Oohh..."

"And it did." Jack finished. The former commodore still looked like he was trying to puzzle the whole thing out in his head, so Jack continued. "Well, I guess what I was trying to say was that I'm in love with you." He looked down, kind of embarrassed, and was playing with his rings.

Norrington was looking into the sea, but at that last comment, his head jolted towards Jack Sparrow. His eyes were soft, and glistened as if he were about to cry. James's hand found Jack's chin, and lifted his head up. He traced the other man's jaw line and was searching into dark eyes as he said, "You what?"

"I'm in love with you. You bloody heard me."

James Norrington smiled as if those were the words he had been waiting for his whole life. They embraced, Norrington somewhere between laughing and crying, and after a long moment, James pulled them apart just enough to be able to kiss his love full on the lips for the very first time. Jack tasted of rum, a taste he normally despised, but he didn't give a damn. He was too busy letting the pirate explore his mouth, and run his fingers through his hair to pay attention.

"Oh dear god," Gibbs looked over to the front of the boat. Anemaria, who was standing next to him, just smiled, shaking her head. "Oh dear god," Gibbs repeated.

Jack and James were getting their breath back, resting their foreheads together. "They're watching," James said warily.

"Let them watch." Jack answered, leaning the former commodore against the rail and meeting his lips again.

END

Well I hope you enjoyed this one-shot. GAHH! I have to get better at writing sappy romance scenes. Anyway, please review so you can tell me what you think, be it good or bad. I would really appreciate some pointers and constructive criticism. Thank you for reading!


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